Natural Beekeeping

Top Bar ApiRevolution has begun! Lets make some inexpensive Top Bar Hives and let them be pesticide free on their own natural comb! Che Guebee is a rebel bee fighting for the survival of the Biodiversity we all depend on and which is seriously endangered by deforestation and mono-crop agriculture! What kind of teaching have you got if you exclude nature?

Tuesday, April 29, 2014

Splitting hives and Unbelievable News !!!!

The air outside is filled with a nectar smell from various flowers: Dandelions, Cherries, Plums, Canola, various bushes and tress like Maple ... So much forage, the nature is exploding into life :)
Bees are flying very well bringing in lots of nectar and pollen. I have decided to split all the colonies and let them build new Queens.

Papa Dusko working the Che Guebee Apiary consisting of Top Bar Hives

I do the first splits always in the same fashion: I take out the old Queen and move it into a new empty hive with 3 combs of capped brood and 2 combs of nectar/honey. I give them a cup of water since they mostly have house bees and I place a tree branch in front of the entrance to force the bees to re-orientate so they don't fly back to their mother colony. This worked for me well last year and I have got this tip from Michael Bush (use google).

I have placed a tree branch infront of the entrance of new splits. This way bees
cant just fly out but must struggle to get out of the hive. This cause them to re-orientate (orientation flights)
and learn that this is their new entrance.

Now about the Unbelievable News :))
I decided to open the hives which suffered during the transport from Sweden just to check their status and to see if they have begun building Queen Cells since there was no way Queens could have survived that catastrophe (previous posts). Once I started inspecting the combs I quickly realized that they DO HAVE A QUEEN :)) capped brood, and eggs and larvae in all stages AMAZING!
Then I checked the hive which suffered even more and had only 2 handfuls of bees left and out of 10 only 2 combs didn't collapse. They had started building some more combs but everything looked like a very weak colony and then I saw IT :)) Eggs, new eggs but no larvae! Anyway they sure must have a Queen in there right so I looked more and found her in great condition! How is this possible!?!?! This colony was one of my biggest before the comb collapse during transport. Thousands of dead bees, me shaking out the bees onto the ground in front of the hive, all bees dead and alive covered in nectar. total catastrophe YET :)) she survived, WOW and thousand time more WOWs :)) Im totally over my head :)) yeah!!! I gave them a few more combs from a stronger colony but Im not worried since they will sure build up fine this summer.

One of the hives is starting to boom with bees and I can see queen cups but no larvae in them. I wanted to split this colony too but could not find the queen. I inspected the combs 4 times to no avail, so I just close the hive. This is the only colony which started building combs in the super above them. Im sure they will start making new Queens soon. I might split them in about 2 weeks or let them swarm and collect the swarm instead.

The one colony which survived the winter queen-less is indeed queen-less and they are not going to make it if they dont get a new queen so I might give them a ripe Queen Cell from another colony of mine.

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About Me

What is Natural Beekeeping?

"Natural Beekeeping" is a concept, an idea which springs from a human mind and as such will differ from one person to another, from one culture to another, depending on our limited and conditioned perception about what it IS being a Honeybee. Since natural beekeeping is an idea and not the actuality it is not to be taken rigidly. Instead it is to be directly inspired by the Actuality. But let's avoid going too philosophical about it and let me simply describe how I see "natural beekeeping" benefiting honeybees (these are only guidelines not a dogma);

- bees overwinter on their own honey stores (feeding sugar syrup ONLY if absolutely necessary)

- lots of peace (low interference from the beekeepers part)

- treatment free (The only way to have a sustainable system of beekeeping is to stop treating, instead making splits from survivor colonies seems the most natural way to me)

- bees are allowed to raise as many Drones as needed (no drone culling)

- natural Queen selection resulting in the strongest Queen (no queen cell culling and only working with local Queens or my own)

- pesticide free bee zone and supporting organic farming (this is a global issue and must be dealt with locally first through environmental organisations and by buying and growing organic food/clothing, etc ...)

- expanding my apiary every year by making splits using Queen Cells from my own strong survivor colonies or catching local swarms. This is the best way to counteract winter losses.

- planting for the bees flowering trees, bushes and plants covering all seasons. Biodiversity is the best healer for the bees and all other creatures.